1 Chapter 1: Filial Piety after Father's Death

"Doflamingo, Rosinante, I'm sorry..."

"No, don't! Brother..."

...

"Ugh, seriously? Why are you making such a fuss so early in the morning?"

Michael clenched his fist instinctively, wanting to punch the guy disturbing his peaceful dream.

"Bang!"

"NOOO Father ... Brother WHY ~"

The desperate cries and questioning echoed in his ears, mingling with the chaotic memories in his mind, causing Michael to experience sharp pain.

He pressed his left hand firmly against his throbbing forehead to ease the discomfort.

As his vision slowly cleared, Michael realized that something was off; he recognize this place and  never seen this scene before.

Before him lay the lifeless body of Donquixote Homing, with Rosinante mourning beside him.

With a cold gaze fixed upon his own child-like right hand, clutching the smoking pistol, Michael remained speechless, a cruel silence engulfing the moment.

"What's this? Killing a father at the start of the game, or same kind of movie ?

"Gotta hand it to that kid, he's one hell of an actor."

Without hesitation, Michael's eyes darted around, his mind racing to recollect the environment from his memories.

Apart from trash, there was only ... more trash?

Absorbing the damp and gloomy setting, with piles of trash huddled in the corners. His surroundings painted a bleak and desolate picture that felt eerily familiar.

The stench of decay filled the air.

He involuntarily sniffed, overwhelmed by the smell of rotting food and the iron rust of fresh blood.

It made him gag.

"Ugh."

"Cursed luck! Just like in games, my experience with opening treasure chests is dreadful, and yet again, there's no surprise here."

"I wasted two and a half years training in a trashy company, and now I find myself stuck in this messed-up world."

It's like sending a package; you place things on top, and they get delivered from below."

Ever so gradually, the tumultuous memories began to merge, intermingling his own recollections with those of another person, entwined in a bizarre and almost fantastical web akin to celestial dragon ballshit.

After savoring those memories for a moment.

Wait a minute!

How did I get here?? what happened in my past life? Let me think.

After signing a preliminary contract with the company, I joined some co-workers for a banquet, indulging in wine before finally heading back to my shabby apartment. But then, out of nowhere, came the big truck!

Letting his thoughts wander for a while, Michael gave up trying to figure it out, from now on his name is Doflamingo.

"Whatever, I'm here now.

Think positively; becoming a king in the future is way better than being a leek in the previous life. The current predicament is just temporary.

I can't let the Navy take away my little brother."

With his mind made up, Doflamingo put down the smoking pistol and hung it at his waist, cherishing the gun now buffed with patricidal power.

Looking at Rosinante, who was still sobbing while leaning on his father's corpse, Doflamingo spoke gently.

"Rosinante, is it the physical wounds or the emotional ones that hurt more?"

Hearing his brother's words, Rosinante, crying uncontrollably, trembled.

With such drastic changes in his life, his mother had passed away not long ago, and now his father was gone too.

Moreover, his father was killed by his own brother!

Grief, pain, fear, and hatred swirled inside young Rosinante, rendering him speechless and unable to respond.

"I'll have to shape him into my image!"

Looking at Rosinante, still burying his head in the corpse and weeping, Doflamingo couldn't help but think that way.

He pulled him up, interrupting his sorrow.

"Rosinante, look at this man called father. It's his innocence that shattered our family."

"He made our kind-hearted mother suffer in pain. He made you and me wander like stray dogs, enduring suffering and hunger."

"Innocence and kindness are qualities that only the strong deserve to possess. As former Celestial Dragons, we are now nothing more than weaklings trampled upon by others."

"Now, we need to find a way to survive, Rosinante."

Regarding their father in this life.

Doflamingo's assessment was that he was an idealistic racial equality advocate without power.

No, not without power, but rather a saintly player who renounced power.

In this world, choosing kindness and coexisting peacefully with ordinary people as Celestial Dragons was a rare and precious quality, undoubtedly showcasing a human brilliance beyond the ordinary.

However.

If you wanted to be kind and coexist peacefully with others, wouldn't the role of Celestial Dragons be more significant?

Or, become stronger first, and then enjoy life with the ordinary people.

But no, they had to directly strip off their Celestial Dragon status and join a non-World Government affiliated country, sealing their own fate.

Although it was him, as the son, who exposed their identities.

This would inevitably happen sooner or later, regardless of when.

On another note.

If he had chosen to live in a country under the World Government, there might have been a chance of being helped by the Navy if discovered.

But now, the intense hatred towards Celestial Dragons among the common people was entirely unclear to them; it was so obvious, they had been suffering for a long time.

They could have been pursued by them as a family.

In a desperate situation, they should have left themselves an escape route. Instead, they went all-in like pure gambling.

The entire family discarded their Celestial Dragon status.

As a result, Homing's wife, the mother of his children, died.

If it were the current Doflamingo, he would definitely keep his saintly father, Donquixote Homing, alive.

Shooting him with a gun would be too easy; he'd leave him to experience the pain of losing his wife, the guilt for causing all of this, the regret, and the burden of his son's wrongdoing.

Who knows, maybe he would try to justify patricide, killing his own son to save the world?

What a precious and marvelous material for observing human nature!

Thinking about these, Doflamingo's tone became more severe, and the surging power in his body grew stronger. Threads emerged from his hands as he grabbed Rosinante's hands.

"Do you remember being hunted, burned, and left desperate, hanging on the city walls? Have we ever harmed the residents here?"

"Do you remember those fellow Celestial Dragons in Mariejois who turned a blind eye to us? It was they who forced our mother to her death and killed our father!"

"Rosinante, look at me. Look at the scars on your body and mine. Look around at the dirty, dilapidated environment we now live in. Look at these crawling, lowly worms!"

"Who brought all this upon us? It was the so-called innocent residents here, our fellow Celestial Dragons, and our father who once loved us!"

"And I... I saved your life. Rosinante, you are my only family now!"

Damn, he's trying to sow discord and use moral blackmail.

Doflamingo didn't believe that an eight-year-old child could bear no resentment towards such a tragic experience.

As soon as these painful memories touched his heart, he couldn't help but churn with thoughts of killing.

Rosinante listened to Doflamingo's words, recalling how his brother had brought him food, scavenged, and searched for food for their mother.

As for their father...

While Doflamingo looked at the still silent Rosinante, he no longer suppressed the agitation caused by the fusion of his two sets of memories.

Black and red Haki lightning flashed suddenly.

Crush!!

Rosinante's eyes rolled back, and he collapsed onto Donquixote Homing's corpse, fainting.